Stage 4 - August 7: Landgraaf (Ned) - Verviers (Bel), 232 km

Ballan tastes success again in Belgium

Verbrugghe extends lead on a farcical stage

Alessandro Ballan (Lampre-Caffita) has won the fourth stage of the Eneco Tour
of Benelux, which can be best described as "torrid", both because of the stormy
weather and the tempestuous emotions that arose when the race had to be stopped
after the peloton was sent the wrong way. Although the 232 km stage between
Landgraaf and Verviers had an unscheduled stop with 43 km to go, fortunately
there was enough left for a proper finale to be ridden, and Ballan chose the
perfect wheel to come off to win the stage.

It was Russian Champion Serguei Ivanov (T-Mobile), who was very active in
the closing stages, that led into the final corner with 250 metres to go with
Ballan on his wheel. In third was Thomas Dekker, who let the gap go around the
corner and effectively gave Ballan a 10 metre bonus in the sprint. That was
enough for the Italian classics specialist, who earlier this year won a stage
and finished second overall in the Driedaagse van De Panne, as well as placing
sixth in the Ronde van Vlaanderen. Ballan surged over Ivanov for the victory
while race leader Rik Verbrugghe (Quick.Step) rode an excellent sprint to finish
second ahead of Leif Hoste and Allan Davis, increasing his lead in the general
classification to 6 seconds over Davis.

"At the start of the sprint, I chose the wheel of Sergey Ivanov," said Ballan.
"I felt that there was a gap behind us, so I gave everything and came over Ivanov
for the win." The Italian added that he loved racing in the wet weather, and
that it was "probably an ally for me today."

On the disruption to the race, Ballan commented, "Well, it was an unfortunate
affair. We were constantly getting closer to the leaders. We would have definitely
got them in the finale. I won here, that's actually what interests me the most."

Race leader Rik Verbrugghe was happy with himself after increasing his lead
on GC. "Erik Dekker and Allan Davis showed themselves to be very active in the
intermediate sprints, so that at one point I was on the same time as Davis.
Therefore I had to sprint for the seconds and with my second place I've done
well. I give myself a 50 percent chance to win the Eneco Tour. It will be hard
fought for every second in the coming days."

Verbrugghe used his local knowledge to lead the peloton back onto the parcours,
after an absent race marshal had caused the whole bunch to go the wrong way
at the bottom of the Cote de Wanne with 64 km to go. "I quickly realised that
we had gone the wrong way," he said. "Going back was impossible with all the
cars behind us, so I gave the sign to ride further. I know the roads in the
area, although I knew we had to do a few more kilometres. Finally we got back
on the right road."

For the race organisers to stop the break was "maybe not really right," according
to Verbrugghe. "But we probably would have caught them."

Sunderland explains

Team CSC's first director Scott Sunderland was back with the peloton when
the whole mess occurred. He explained it all to Cyclingnews: "It happened
at the bottom of the descent after the Wanne. Instead of going left, they took
us straight. One of the signallers had left his post. He'd gone on ahead and
didn't stay there. By the time we realised it, we were halfway up another hill
and couldn't come back down again.

"The peloton had to do an extra hill, but the lead riders didn't go wrong.
The commissaires messed around until they made a decision about it. I told Tristan
Hoffman [CSC's new director] to tell Vandevelde to keep going. In Tirreno-Adriatico
a few years ago, the peloton went the wrong way and it was the end of the race.
Back then it was up to the riders to know. Apparently now, the commissaire said
we have a thing called "un accident de course", which means they have the right
to stop the race and restart it with the proper time differences.

"It depends on which point of view you have: On one side, there's Davitamon,
Discovery, and me. On the other is Rabobank and Liberty. For me it was double
sided: a) I've got someone in front for the stage win, and b) I've got Frank
Schleck, Bobby Julich, and Michael Blaudzun trying to open it up for the overall
classement.

"I was talking to the commissaire, who said that if they [the breakaways]
don't stop he'll disqualify them and cancel the whole stage. So I said, 'OK,
we'll go ahead and we'll discuss this later.'"

"For me, I wanted to make a decision and do it quickly. When they stopped
them, they didn't give them the full 6'30. If they could have had that extra
minute, then maybe it would have been different. Also, all the other teams regrouped;
Rabobank and Liberty gained some extra men. At the end of it, it was a completely
bad situation. It was very bad for the riders, the race, everything.

"But we had to keep racing. I'm frustrated with how it was, with everyone
being inconvenienced. You're there to race, not sit around discussing it. We
had to go on."

"I'm very happy with how the team rode. We have the mountain jersey, and we've
been animating the race. We'll see what happens - maybe we can still do something.
It's going to be harder but not impossible."

How it unfolded

159 riders started in the Dutch town of Landgraaf at 10:50 am, ready for the
232 km queen stage of the Eneco Tour. If yesterday was a mini-Amstel Gold Race,
today was a mini-Liege-Bastogne-Liege, featuring several of the Ardennes climbs
used in La Doyenne and finishing in Verviers. The weather was cool, with temperatures
between 10 and 18 degrees, and storms predicted during the day. Non-starters
today were Thomas Ziegler and Manuele Mori.

The peloton stayed together until the first intermediate sprint after 36 km,
where Erik Dekker won ahead of Allan Davis and Rik Verbrugghe. That effectively
put Davis on equal time with Verbrugghe on the general classification, although
there was still a lot of racing to come. 45.8 km were covered in the first hour,
and when the bunch hit the Côte d'Halembaye, a group of four riders had got
clear: Jason McCartney (Discovery Channel) was first over, followed by Bart
Dockx (Davitamon-Lotto), Christian Vandevelde (CSC), and Finnish champion Jussi
Veikkanen (FDJ).

The quartet gained ground fairly quickly, as Vandevelde was the best placed
on GC at 6'30 down, so presented no great threat to the overall lead. However,
once the gap got to nine minutes, Rabobank started to control the situation
and didn't let the four get much further ahead. In the meantime, Giosue Bonomi
(Lampre), Brian Vandborg (CSC), and Frank Vandenbroucke (MrBookmaker) all pulled
out, while up front, Vandevelde began to take the maximum points on the climbs,
eventually capturing the mountains jersey at the end of the day.

Quick.Step joined Rabobank in the chase and with 95 km to go, the gap was
9'21 but falling. The chase was solid, and the two strong teams were doing enough
to pull back the four leaders at about one minute every 10 kilometres. On the
Côte de la Haute Levée with 64 km to go, Veikkanen couldn't follow any more
and left the other three in front with a lead of around 6'30. In the peloton,
Marzio Bruseghin (Fassa Bortolo) attacked with Matej Mugerli (Liquigas) over
the top of the Côte de Wanne, but Bruseghin was too strong for the Slovenian
and continued on his own in pursuit of the break. He was only 2'39 down on GC,
and presented a bigger threat.

Then the disaster struck the peloton at the bottom of the descent after the
Côte de Wanne, when an absent race marshal caused the peloton to go straight
ahead rather than left [Bruseghin and Mugerli went the correct way]. By the
time the riders realised, it was too late to go back down and it was race leader
and local boy Rik Verbrugghe who led the bunch over an extra climb and back
onto the parcours. The bunch was now 15 minutes behind the break, and had little
chance of catching it with just 55 km to go. Meanwhile, Bruseghin had closed
to within 5'00.

The commissaires decided in favour of the peloton and asked Vandevelde, McCartney
and Dockx to stop at the top of the Rosier and wait for the bunch, so that the
gap could be reduced to what it was before the shenanigans at the Côte de Wanne.
But the three leaders refused to stop, and it was only the intervention of the
police with 43 km to go that halted their progress. Bart Dockx immediately sat
on the ground in protest and argued with race director Rob Discart, calling
the whole situation "laughable" as he and his two companions had done nothing
wrong. Vandevelde accepted it philosophically, while McCartney used the break
to commune with nature. But the organisers had made their decision and the break
was forced to wait while Bruseghin, Mugerli, Veikkanen, Muravyev (who had also
attacked the bunch), and finally the peloton caught up.

The restart saw the three leaders go with around four minutes (taking into
account the extra 20 km they rode) of their gap intact. Bruseghin was allowed
to go about 2'00 behind, then the peloton set off, led by Liberty Seguros and
Rabobank, who had gained a few more riders in the meantime. Bruseghin now had
no chance, and was caught with 26 km to go as the race hit a hailstorm. The
front three were fading and had only 2'00 of their gap intact, and when Kevin
de Weert took over on the Côte Annete, it dropped to a minute.

Erik Dekker and Sergey Ivanov started to stir things up on the small climb,
but were unable to shake Verbrugghe and co. At 20 km to go, Jose Ivan Gutierrez
(Illes Balears) got a gap, and caught the three leaders on the last climb of
the day, the Côte de Surister. Ivanov countered behind, taking Julich (CSC)
and Rebellin (Gerolsteiner) with him, and when the three caught Gutierrez, a
dangerous 10 second gap opened with 15 km to go.

Julich was the strongest in the break and kept the Liberty and Rabobank-led
peloton at bay, but with 5 km to go, it was all together again with a group
of 36 riders coming to the finish to contest the sprint. Rene Andrle kept the
pace up for Allan Davis in the last 1.5 km, before Thomas Dekker took over at
800m to go. Then it was Ivanov moving up past Dekker to reach the final corner
in first place, with Alessandro Ballan on his wheel. Dekker left a small gap
behind and that was enough security for Ballan to claim the stage win ahead
of Verbrugghe, Hoste, and Davis.

At the end of the day, Verbrugghe leads Davis by 6 seconds and Blaudzun by
14, but with 16 riders still within a minute of each other, it's quite possible
for things to change before Wednesday's final time trial. The next two stages
are flat, and Verbrugghe will be counting on help from the sprinters' teams
to keep it together.